At the last minute Palmdale Mayor James Ledford challenged incumbent Sharon Runner in the 36th Assembly District. He has already mailed twice and looks like he willtry to win. But he is already in trouble.

Ledford as Mayor of Palmdale wrote to Sharon Runner to SUPPORT tripling the car tax! That should go over well in a GOP primary. (of course CRA is supporting Runner—Full Disclosure). See the letter for yourself below.… Read More

This coming weekend, the California Democratic Party will meet in Sacramento. There will be much drama surrounding whether or not State Treasurer and former State Democratic Party Chairman Phil Angelides will get the official endorsement of the Party he once led.

That said, you look at the Democratic Primary between Angelides and Westly, and any Republican really has to ask the question, which of these candidates will likely fair worse against Governor Schwarzenegger in the November ballot. If you ask Schmidt, Soderland and company, I’m sure that they will happily tell you that when we come into the home stretch, the Governator will clean the clock of either candidate handily. That said, there are a lot of folks that think Steve Westly would be a more challenging opponent for November, both because of his extremely deep pockets and the fact that Angelides is vulnerable to so many more attacks.

So here is my grand idea! For those of you who do not remember, the Governor’s Chief of Staff, unfortunately, is a liberal Democrat by the name of Susan Kennedy. While seeming to be a very nice person, Kennedy has spent her professional career… Read More

I’m waaay overdue for some posting here on FR.

Now that the 35th SD special election is over, focus is drifting back to the pocketful of contested elections on the June ballot.

The 67th AD primary is most directly impact by Assemblyman Tom Harman’s victory over Diane Harkey. Now he’s the presumed incumbent Senator for the next eight years, instead of a termed-out lame duck. As such, he’s in a much stronger position to help his wife Dianne succeed him in the Assembly.

Thus far, Mrs. Harman’s campaign has been overshadowed by the slugfest going on between Cypress Councilman Mike McGill and OC Supervisor Jim Silva.

Until a few months ago, the expectation (which I shared) was that Jim Silva would roll into this seat. Neither Harman nor McGill were considered serious candidates. In the last few monhts, however, McGill has revamped his campaign with $120,000 in his own funds and aggressive tactics from new campagin manager Joe Ghiardiello and Cal-YAFers. Their strategy is to positon McGill as… Read More

The Americans for Taxpayers Reform meeting (aka…the “Secret Squirrel” meeting) went very well. Because of the rules of the meeting, I can’t go into details. But I will risk excommunication by saying two things – Eric Roach was well received, and also a TY to Grover Norquist for letting me say a few words about the FlashReport!

The ATR meeting is a group of primarily fiscally oriented folks. We are now off to another conservative meeting coordinated by movement leader Paul Weyrich, and this meeting is much more oriented towards social conservatives. I’m sure Eric will be well received at this meeting, too.

We’re being accompanied to these meetings by Steve Baldwin, who heads up the Council for National Policy, a premiere coordinating group of conservative leaders from around the nation. Baldwin for years was an Assemblyman in San Diego County. He is enthusiastic about Eric, but I am sure he is also motivated by the memory of Brian Bilbray endorsing his Democratic opponent in his first, unsuccessful run for the Assembly.

It is amazing how many people Roach has spoken with who are anxious to have a strong… Read More

The meeting with the Weyrich group was outstanding. It underscored two important points – social conservatives are disheartened with the idea of a long-term stint for Brian Bilbray in Congress (again, we all think that he is better than Busby, but altogether unremarkable). There was tremendous excitement for Eric from many leaders of important conservative groups.

As an aside, I had a great talk with former Congressman Pat Toomey, who heads up the Club for Growth. He is very concerned about Congress assaulting the first amendment rights of 527 advocacy groups.

Now we are headed to Capitol Hill to meet with various conservative leaders in Congress!

Yes, this is a rush! Let me add, by the way, that the more time I spend ith Eric, the more I really come to realize what a great person he is – truly dedicated to our Republican principles!… Read More

Eric Roach and I were walking by the Judiciary Committee meeting room in the Rayburn House Office Buidlng, and noticed a lot of people going in. Eric asked the young lady at the door what was going on…and she told us a, “hearing on the National Security Agency syping on Americans.”

Eric and I walked up the hallway, looked at each other, and speaking about the young lady, we simultaneously said, “Democrat.”… Read More

We’ve been having productive meetings with Eric Roach on The Hill. It really resonated with Congressman Buck McKeon when we talked about how a Roach candidacy that is driving UP Republican turnout for the election day can only HELP the party keep the 50th in GOP hands. The opportunity of a Roach candidacy is a conservative Congressman long-term for the 50th. The danger if Roach doesn’t run is a suppresed GOP turnout and a real danger of a Busby win in June.

After all, there was a lot of pressure on Tom McClintock to stand down his campaign for Governor in the special election. But in reality, it was likely the increased conservative turnout is what put the first question, the recall of Davis, over the top. Had McClintock not driven conservative turnout, we might still have Gray Davis in office.

For those tired of this string, cut me some slack. I’ve never “live-blogged a trip to DC and I’m having fun!… Read More

Richard Pombo is a great Congressman. A principled conservative who has brought common sense to the Chairmanship of the House Resources Committee. It was great to be able to catch up with him. It’s one thing to write about these folks on this site — it’s another thing to get to talk to them! We had a chance to meet with Pombo – a great meeting. Steve Ding, his Chief-of-Staff is a close FR friend.

It was also nice to see another old friend today, Chuck Cunningham. Chuck is the political director at the National Rifle Association. A great guy and an FR subscriber. Chuck spent some time explaining how Bilbray earned his “F” ratins from the NRA because of his appearances with then-President Bill Clinton at pro-gun control events.

I did experience a bout of post-traumatic stress when we spent time at the Dwight D. Eisenhower Center, the headquarters building of the Republican National Committee. We went there since Eric Roach had a meeting scheduled with RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman.

I don’t know if I mentioned the wonderful weather here – balmy and nice. It’s been a great day!… Read More